


Reprieve

by Multifandom_damnation



Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types
Genre: Brotherly Bonding, Emotional Baggage, Empath, Gen, I'm Bad At Tagging, Military Background, Scars, Twilight Renaissance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-25
Updated: 2020-06-25
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:41:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24903232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Multifandom_damnation/pseuds/Multifandom_damnation
Summary: Their emotions settle like years of dust on the credenza, like spiderwebs in the ceiling, and though he loves them very much, Jasper has just got to get away before it all becomes too much for him. It's a good thing that Emmett understands, and that Edward tends to have the same reaction to avoiding unnecessary conflict.
Relationships: Emmett Cullen & Jasper Hale
Comments: 12
Kudos: 26





	Reprieve

**Author's Note:**

> There's probably a lot of mistakes in this, but you know what? I tried my best. I watched Twilight for the first time last week, and it was actually pretty good! But this was fun to write, even though I lost steam towards the end. I hope it's not obvious. I also tried out a new writing style for this fic, but I might have lost it a little half-way through, but I like how it turned out. Anyway, thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy it x

It was early afternoon when Jasper found himself outside, standing on the edge of a cliff overlooking the dreary town of Forks, not far from the family home, but far enough to no longer feel the stifling, overwhelming emotions that threatened to overwhelm him at every moment and bubbled up at the back of his throat like burning bile. 

Tensions in the house had been high lately, and arguments were a comment sight to come by. Jasper had been spending less and less time within the four walls of his own home, the tension escalating to an unbearable level, and he retreated to the safety of the room he shared with Alice, and when even that no longer was the safe-haven it once was, he was outside, running through the woods or hunting for a meal or, like today, standing on the highest peak he could find, gazing over the cloudy town of Forks, the buildings and civilians hidden by the thick fog low around their ankles, wading through it like a high flood, the thick air settling heavily in their lungs. 

Eventually, everything would die down. Rosalie would retreat to the false safety of the garage, filled with her cars and tools and projects never forgotten, and Alice would whisk Bella out and away on some sort of adventure that would appeal to both their hearts. Emmett too would leave the house, desperate to give himself something else to do but worry about his wife and his siblings. Edward would go brood somewhere, lost in his thoughts and seeking the solace he craved. Edward always was the more solitary of the Cullen clan, even more so than Jasper himself. Esme would return to her work. Carlisle would return to his book, now that the situation had resolved itself as well as it could have without his intervention, and the house was quiet once more. 

Despite the house being somewhat empty, and all the high-strung tension had died down, Jasper wouldn’t dare return now. The emotions still clung to the walls like tar and shook him to the core like a cold arctic wind. Too-loud, too-much, too-stifling in the confines of their home, no windows open to give it all the opportunity to escape. And why should they? Nobody but Jasper could feel how it lingered, how it festered in the corners like spiderwebs and piled atop the credenza like years worth of untouched dust. He tried not to mention it. Nobody really wanted to be reminded. 

It made people uncomfortable, to be reminded that he could manipulate their feelings at any time, that they could never be sure if their emotions really belonged to them or if they were a figment of Jasper’s imagination. He could understand. He felt the same way, back when he was nothing but a weapon in Maria’s army. He tried not to touch them in that way, and they knew that. He _hoped_ they knew that. It was a gross breach of trust, an invasion of privacy, something he knew that his siblings, in particular, didn’t take kindly to. That wasn’t to say he never used his gift. Though it was more for his own protection, his own metal barrier than it was to calm them.

He could never calm them even if he tried. They were too brazen, too wild, too head-strong. Pig-headed and absolute, he wouldn’t change them for the world.

But sometimes it all just got too much, and though he couldn’t breathe, the amount of it threatened to drown him, to choke him, to suffocate him by building up at the back of his throat and pushing behind his eyes. It was always and had always been, too much. But there was nothing he could do about it, nothing he would do. He’d never ask the people he loved to dull their emotions, to hold them back, to hide them from him. He would cope, as he had for centuries, and would not complain.

He felt Emmett before he saw him. A deep-seated frustration, an agitation that rattled deep in his bones and unsettled him to his core, an anxiety that was so individually  _ Emmett _ . Like the fidgeting of fingers, the tapping of feet, the biting of lips, the running of hands through hair. It all felt the same, but it tasted different for each individual. 

“Bad mood?” he asked quietly once Emmett was withing sight. He could feel it. Despite Emmett’s attempt to subdue it, it still rattled around in his ribcage like a bird in a box, and Jasper felt it too, a fluttering in his chest like the panicked wings of a baby sparrow desperate to escape. 

Emmett raised an eyebrow, his lip curled up in the shadow of a smile, and Jasper suspected that it would become a full-blow grin soon enough. “I’m that easy to read, huh?”

“For me,” Jasper replied, and Emmett huffed out a laugh. “Is everything alright in there?”

“Yeah,” Emmett replied. “Rose is in the garage. Alice took Bella out shopping in town. Edward is… well, who the hell knows where he goes when he’s not with Bella?”

Jasper hummed. “There had been a new store Alice had wanted to check out,” he said. “She mentioned wanting to take Bella, or maybe Rose. I tried to help her but… my opinion tends to be a little bias.” It was true. In all the time that he had known her, loved her, he had never seen her in something that did not flatter her, that he did not adore. Every fabric, every colour, every shade, every fit, every length, every cut, every item, seemed like it had been designed specifically for her, and she looked glamorous in everything. And she knew that.

He blinked when he felt an elbow in his side, and he glanced at a shy Emmett, and reeled his love back and away from his brother, locking it back up in his chest where it made his bones rattle with the strength of it. “Hopeless romantic.” Emmett joked softly.

“Like you’re one to talk,” Jasper replied, and Emmett did grin then, knowing he was right. But while Emmett was grinning and looked on the outside the same old Emmett that he knew and loved, he didn’t feel the same. There was still something he was holding back, trying to hide, but Jasper could feel it nonetheless. A fit of bubbling anger, jittery anxiety, a rumbling frustration that was more fitting for Rosalie’s personality than Emmett's. Jasper turned to him, partially, and Emmett dropped his eyes to the ground. Jasper turned away. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Emmett shrugged. “But you’re nice to be around, and after having such a stressful few days, I don’t mind spending the tail end watching the sky with you.”

Jasper smiled. “That’s kind,” he said. “Do you want me to…?”

It was a genuine offer, and Emmett knew that, but Jasper would never assume that everyone was like him. Wanting to be separate from his emotions, arms lengths from others. But he knew his siblings, knew people on a base level and knew that sometimes it all got too much, and the last thing anyone wanted was to feel anymore. And he would gladly take that burden for his family, for his siblings, for the ones he loved.

Smiling, Emmett shook his head. Even irate, Emmett was almost always smiling. It was a real gift Jasper envied. “Nah,” he said. “I’m good. Thanks, though.”

Humming again, Jasper looked back towards the town and the faint bustling of people in the streets. Emmett just took the opportunity to watch him. It was rare that he got Jasper like this, just the two of them, in such a calm environment. Maybe that was Jasper’s doing, subconsciously or not. But for once they weren’t fighting for their lives or hunting something dangerous or running full speed through the woods. Everything had been so wild with Edward and Bella and Victoria and James and the Volturi that they had never actually gotten a chance to just  _ be _ .

If you looked, it was obvious that Jasper was a good southern boy, with the light honey-coloured hair and the strong features and the tall frame. But he held himself with the confidence of a boy who had grown up on the battleground, hardworking and steadfast, his chin held high and his eyes filled with self-assurance. It was strange that a man who held himself with such confidence preferred to stand back, off to the sidelines, hide in the shadows. Jasper was a man filled with many mysteries, an enigma all in himself, and over the many years that they had known each other, lived together, considered themselves family, Emmett had never been able to figure him out.

He knew that everything was harder for Jasper. He felt everything so deeply, so strongly, and was forced to deal with the emotions of everyone else on top of it all. Yet he never let any of that show, and if he sent out his influence in deliberate tendrils, it was never enough to change anything too strongly. He never gave voice to his struggle, though everyone knew that he felt it. He was, in every sense of the word, an outlet for his siblings. Sometimes, even more so than Edward, Emmett had suspected that Jasper could read them more than any of them. Emotions were much harder to fake, to hide, to mask than thoughts were. It was easy to confuse Edward by bringing a different thought to mind, but emotions, despite how hard they tried, always portrayed the truth, despite the desperate intention to change them. Jasper wouldn’t comment on it, but they all knew that he felt it. 

Emmett wished he knew Jasper more. He was quiet, subdued. He stayed back, and away entirely sometimes, preferring the freedom of the outdoors when everything got too much. Emmett wished he could understand what it meant to carry such a burden, to possess such a gift. While Jasper wasn’t the only Cullen sibling to have one of these specialities, none seemed to struggle more than Jasper. Emmett had many thoughts, none that he would voice out loud, about Jasper, and the things that he kept to himself. But that was for some other day. Jasper would come to him eventually if he needed it. 

Sometimes Emmett forgot that his brother had fought in a war. At a surface level, you couldn’t tell. Looking deeper, looking closer, the evidence of war was obvious. Jasper always had this dark, haunted look in his eyes. He was vicious and deadly when it was needed. He was swift, delicate, light-footed. His expertise was unparalleled. His body was covered in more scars than he could count. Jasper didn’t like to recount what he did during his time as Maria’s charge, but Emmett could imagine. It wasn’t anything good. It was what had given Jasper that sharp edge, the jagged, broken pieces that rattled in his chest like shards of bone, the chipped and missing pieces of his unbeating heart. Emmett wanted to know what she had done to him to make his gentle, caring brother think himself a monster more than most of his kind. Because Jasper was all those things. While he could be dark and frightening and curt, he was the most gentle Cullen by far, interested in fickle things like sunrises and soft grass underfoot and the thrill of the hunt more than the reward at the end, the wind rushing against his stone-hard skin, whipping his hair against his face. Emmett knew that the good outweighed the bad in Jasper, even if he would never allow himself to see it. But if Maria was still alive, and Emmett suspected she was, he would tear her apart with his bare hands the moment he got the chance.

Above them, the could cover parted for the first time in days, and the sun streamed through the fog to settle over the town in bright, golden beams. Alice had seen it coming and had warned them against a real trip to town, but a shopping adventure was safe enough. 

A beam landed on Jasper, standing further out on the cliff than Emmett, and his hair was ignited in liquid gold, his eyes twinkling in the light. His skin shone, as all of their kind, with the multitude of untouchable beauty that was their unbreakable, diamond skin, shinning and sparkling and glittering. Except, as always, the almost perfect circles on his arms, jagged and crude, that stayed a dull white, as if the sun refused to touch them, his skin refused to wake. 

Curiosity getting the better of him, Emmett reached out and took Jasper’s arm, turning it over in his hands to watch the way the sunlight seemed to avoid the teeth marks that ringed his flesh. Jasper didn’t protest, just watched him with a raised eyebrow. “That’s crazy, you know that?” Emmett said, and Jasper smiled. It was odd to see him smiling without Alice around. It seemed like she was his only source of joy. “I never noticed it before.”

“Well, it’s never like we’ve had an opportunity like this before,” Jasper said. “I never noticed you were so… curious.”

“Curiosity killed the cat.”

“But satisfaction brought it back.”

Like this, standing in the sunlight, Emmett could really see the innumerable scars that littered Jasper’s body like scars. Down his arms, around his throat, and he knew, beneath his clothing, there were scars around his torso that were just as violent. Emmett could never imagine walking around for this long with all those forever attached to his skin, like a regrettable tattoo, permanent yet personal. “Do you ever think about these?” He asked. He vaguely understood what Jasper used to do, used to be. Jasper never talked about it much. It made him sick. But Emmett was no fool, and he was keenly aware that whatever the details were, they wouldn’t be pretty. “How you got them?”

“I try not to,” Jasper admitted, flexing his fingers, and Emmett watched the scars ripple in his grasp. “It was not a very gracious time in my life, and every time I’m reminded of it… well. It doesn’t bode well.” Suddenly, his head snapped up and he looked at Emmett with an unwavering intensity. “Oh, don’t be  _ sad _ , Emmett. It’s nothing, really. I forget that they’re even there most days. It’s nothing to be upset about.”

“I’m not upset,” Emmett insisted, but he didn’t know why he bothered. Jasper knew better, would always know better when it came to that. But thankfully, he didn’t comment, and Emmett released his arm. Jasper let it fall back to his side. He had always appreciated how Emmett’s emotions were often simpler than the others, familiar in their repetitiveness, always positive and bright. So now, the one time that he let something new, something darker, something secretive, slip through the cracks, Jasper was willing to indulge him. “Enough about this, man. I’m bored. Let’s do something. I need to get as far away from that house as I can.”

Jasper didn’t even have to think of an answer, the words coming as naturally to him as his own name, and he assumed that Emmett felt them coming. “Run with me?”

By Emmett’s face-splitting grin, he didn’t need to be asked twice, and without a word, they took off, turning their backs on the murky town of Forks and their home tinged with bad memories and laden in frustration, and faced the woods, filled with thick-trunked trees and an overhead canopy filled with chattering birds. Empty, but not for long.

It wasn’t for the hunt. No, it was for the _thrill_. Hunting would come later, when the sun began to set and the house began to wake again and their need would become a burn at the back of their throats, but for now, it was just the two of them, running side by side through the woods they knew like the back of their hands, weaving around trees and leaping over rivers and dodging boulders. Clumps of dirt unearthed beneath their feet, the occasional knotted vine or uneven ground getting torn up as it tried in vain to trip them. Somewhere, a deer was grazing, maybe two, but they knew to stay away, and neither Cullen was too interested in having to chase them if it came down to it. 

Eventually, they found themselves in a familiar clearing, with unkempt grasses of deep green and untrimmed trees who’s boroughs overhung the space, with leaves that fell and scattered, and a canopy that refused to budge for the sky above. Jasper collapsed on the ground, the adrenaline flowing through his body like a drug, as he let the soft, untouched grass bellow cushion him. A short chuckle later, and Emmett followed his lead, plopping cross-legged beside his brother.

“Feeling better?” Jasper asked. Emmett only snorted. They both knew full well that Jasper could tell that not only had the anger and sadness dissipated from behind that cracking wall he was trying to put up, but they both felt amazing, and were just happy enough to relax and doze in the aftershocks. 

“If only we could have brought the rest of the house along with us,” Emmett said, reaching down and plucking a blade of grass from the ground. “Maybe that way everyone else would be in a better mood too.”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Jasper said as he crossed his arms behind his head. “Edward and Rosalie are rarely in good moods, even with you and Bella around. No, it’s better for them not to be here. Then I only have to deal with you. And that’s plenty enough for me.”

Emmett only rolled his eyes. He couldn’t really argue. Jasper was correct, despite how he regretted to admit it. “Do you think they’re back yet? Alice and Bella?”

From his position on the ground, Jasper shrugged. “I doubt it. Bella might not like to shop, but Alice might take her to a bookstore, or something.”

“Ice-cream,” Emmett suggested. “I hear that it’s nice.”

“I’ve never tried it,” Jasper said. “But I doubt they’d be back until nightfall. Alice might even drop Bella home, depending on what happened today.”

Emmett frowned, a rare expression on his usually smiling face. “What?” Jasper looked at him strangely, feeling a shock and confusion that wasn’t his own bubble in his chest. “You don’t know what happened?”

Jasper shook his head. “I try not to stick around when it gets that bad. I stay away. So no, I’ve got no clue, but it must have been bad if you think Alice would feel the need to drop Bella home. What happened?”

At least Emmett had the grace to look guilty. Jasper could feel it, and he had to look away. “Rose and Edward got into a fight.  _ Another one _ ,” he amended, and Jasper scoffed. Those two were always fighting and had been for centuries, and would for many more to come. “But to be fair, they were both out of their minds, but Rose was right.”

Humming, Jasper shut his eyes. He predicted a long tale. “Of course she was.”

“No, Jazz, I’m being serious,” Emmett insisted. “Edward was doing that thing again, where he comes up with reckless, dangerous and frankly stupid ways of keeping Bella safe. Not like she needs him to keep her safe.”

“From herself, maybe. That woman… is a hazard. The number of times she’s nearly broken her nose by tripping on her own two feet…”

Emmett chuckled. “I know. That’s my favourite thing about her,” he said. “But Edwards a fool. He thinks that he’s the answer to every problem, even when there isn’t one.”

“What did he suggest this time?” Jasper asked. “Building her a submarine and sending her to the bottom of the ocean? Dropping her off onto a deserted island? Forcing her to join the circus so she could never stay in one place too long? Abandoning her, again?”

The humour that rushed from Emmett like water through a dam was something Jasper relished in, and he let it flow over him like a warm embrace. “I’m not sure, though I couldn’t put it past him. I wasn’t there when it started, but somehow, I was part of the problem.”

“And then Rose got mad at you for not agreeing with her, even though you didn’t know what you were agreeing to?”

Emmett huffed a sigh. “Yeah.”

Jasper couldn’t help but laugh. After so many years, they were all the same. Part of him was glad for the constant, the rare stability in his life. But he wouldn’t change them for the world.

They sat there in silence for a little while, enjoying each others company, lost in their own minds for however long it was. Time was different for them. It was inconsequential, untouchable, and had little real worth. It passed just as quickly or as slowly as it needed to, and they barely felt it. Emmett had a contemplative, miserable look on his face, and Jasper could feel the anxiety, the sadness that almost suffocated him, but he decided not to mention it. Whatever was going on in his head was his alone, and though Edward had the ability to, it was nobody’s business to pry.

Suddenly, Jasper was bombarded by melancholy, slow-moving and as thick as sticky molasses. He sat up slightly on his elbows and raised his eyebrows at Emmett, who looked up at the movement. “We have company.”

Instantly, Emmett was on alert, and Jasper could feel the way the tension rolled through his frame in droves. “How can you be sure?”

Jasper had no choice but to roll his eyes. The emotion was too familiar to him to be unsure. He lived with it for centuries. “Are you currently feeling bittersweet and sorry for yourself?”

Understanding crossed over Emmett’s face as he immediately relaxed. “Oh. Edward.”

As if he were summoned, Edward flounced into the clearing, a brooding, pensive look on his face, and his frown only deepened when he saw both his brothers staring at him as he entered. “Rough couple of days?” Jasper asked, and Edward scoffed.

Instead of answering, Edward sunk down to join his brothers in the lush, untrodden grass and leant his back against the trunk of a tree. “That’s one way to put it.”

Chuckling, Jasper fell back against the ground, his hair spreading out like a halo around his head. Emmett watched him, and watch the way Edward shut his eyes and let the faint sunlight streaming through the leaves above turn his skin to diamond, glittering over his sharp cheekbones and delicate yet fierce features. Emmett didn’t know him when he was human, but he doubted that the transformation into a vampire had anything to do with his beauty.

Folding his hands over his chest, Jasper scrunted up his nose and resisted the urge to turn his face away. “Stop brooding, Edward. It’s obnoxious.”

“I’m not brooding.”

“I can _feel_ it, Edward.”

“I _don’t_ brood.”

Emmett made a noise of disbelief, and Edward turned to glare at him. “Yeah, you do. You’re the biggest drama queen I’ve ever met, and my wife is Rosalie.”

“Maybe,” Jasper suggested with the hint of a smile on his lips, “You should do a theatre course at the next school we enrol in. I’m sure you’d pass with flying colours. You know, with all the dramatic fashion in which you live every aspect of your life.”

“Oh, I would pay good money to see that,” Emmett chuckled. “Edward, up on stage, preforming McBeth and Hamilton?”

“Yeah, har-har, very funny,” Edward retorted, glaring at them each in turn before he shut his eyes tightly and rested his chin to his chest, hands folded across his lap. If anyone else had seen him, they would have assumed he was mealy sleeping, peacefully at that. But his brothers knew the truth.

Jasper sighed. It was nice, being able to sit somewhere quiet with just his brothers, not bombarded by constant anger and frustration and Alice’s kind compassion. He loved it, loved them both, loved Rosalie and Alice and Esme and Carlisle and Bella too, but sometimes it was nice to just be. There was still the toxic tint of Edward’s familiar brooding, him being his miserable, overdramatic self. But while Emmett was content in his brother’s company, there was something secretive and underlying that tasted a little bit like guilt and regret and remorse. Jasper didn’t need to read minds to know what Emmett was thinking about, but Edward’s reaction, snapping his eyes open a little too fast and sending Emmett a confused, unreadable look, was all the answer that Jasper needed. Edward didn’t comment, just read Emmett’s thoughts like reading an old book, but Jasper needed to say something about it. “Emmett,” he tried, but he didn’t get very far.

Emmett’s walls were flung up faster than Jasper could blink, and though he could still feel it through the permanent cracks, it was dulled down to a soft ache rather than a vibrant burn. “Guys, come on,” Emmett grinned, and it was so comforting and Jasper forgot what he was going to say. “This is nice. It’s not often that we get to do this, huh? Hang out, just the three of us?”

Edward rolled his eyes. “Yeah, because I have much more important people that I’d rather be spending time with than you.” But he didn’t sound sincere, and Jasper felt the way his heart, though dead as it was, pulsed with love. He was grateful for it.

“Don’t look at me,” Jasper said. “My wife doesn’t need me by her side every moment of every day. Unlike Rosalie, who loves you unconditionally and who gets jealous over a fly if it so much as touches her precious Emmett, and Bella, who is a constant danger to herself in ways that even I cannot comprehend.”

There was no arguing that. “We should do this more often,” Emmett insisted. “Guy’s night.”

“Guy’s night?” Edward scoffed, raising an eyebrow. “That’s stupid. We’re not humans, spending our nights drinking around barbeques watching the football.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Emmett argued. “We don’t have to change anything. Hunting together, practising together, even just doing this every once in a while,” he waved a hand at them. “I think it’d be nice.”

Jasper, eyes closed once again, hummed happily. “I think it’s a great idea, Emmett, but only if you two don’t argue like this the whole time. I don’t think I’d be able to take it for long.”

The silence of the peaceful clearing was broken by laugher, light and genuine, and above them, some birds squawked and fluttered from their branches. An elk stalked the other direction, avoiding them at all cost. Jasper was grateful for the short moment of respite, the silence after the storm. A feeling of peace had settled in his bones that he missed. Alice would be home soon, he knew, and she would enrich him with all the amazing things she brought, and he would tell her he loved them, loved her, and would spin her around in his arms and would kiss her until a normal human would lose breath, and would kiss her even more. He couldn’t wait to get home.

He almost forgot that Edward was there until he cleared his throat, and when Jasper opened his eyes and glanced up at him, he caught a knowing, understanding look in his brother’s eye, and a small smile curled at the edges of his lips. “We should probably get back soon,” he said quietly. “Esme and Carlisle might get worried. It got pretty heated back there. They might assume the worst.”

“Yeah,” Emmett sighed. “Rose might be waiting for me to get home. Alice would probably be back by now too, Jasper. We should go.”

Honestly, Jasper didn’t want to leave. He was happy here in the clearing with his brothers, in the calm setting he missed so much. It was rare, with moments like this far and few between. He knew that the moment he returned to that house, filled with people he loved, yes, but coated like paint and stuffed to the brim with so much emotion that it almost suffocated him, he would just have to deal with it, as he had learned to do over the many years until it overwhelmed him and he would have to cope with any way he could. 

But Alice would be there, and Alice would help, and that was all the incentive he needed.

As he sat up, he didn’t miss the sympathetic way that Edward looked at him, never able to keep away from the thoughts in other peoples heads, and he let Emmett help him clamber to his feet, though they all knew he didn’t need the help. “Yeah,” He said. “Let’s head back before they realize we’re missing.”

Edward won the race back home, but Jasper and Emmett were greeted by kisses from their loved ones, while Edward received a lecture from Bella about not needing his protection, so the real winner remained undecided for the remainder of the night.

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea that Jasper's blood-lust is so much stronger than his siblings because he's constantly feeling all their thirst on top of is own, so that's they he lost control at Bella's birthday, you know? I was supposed to mention that specific thing in this but I just forgot and didn't know how to add it, so oh well.


End file.
